| A few cogwheels in Blaise Pascal's seventeenth century calculator perform the entire procedure of addition better and faster than a human mind. |
| They stood before Blaise, wearing black clothing, heads lowered, sightless eyes glaring at him from under stringy hair. |
| What I never knew until now is that February 3, the day after Candlemas, is the Feast of St Blaise, the patron saint of wool combers. |
| Blaise asked, sitting up, but falling back in pain, his head hitting a soft feather pillow. |
| Wykk's finger pointed to the brown slop that was called food and with a resigned glance at where Blaise had sat I ate. |
| He eventually became deputy head and ultimately headteacher of St Blaise School in Bierley. |
